Vaccinations

[bakaduin]

I was reading through my newspaper yesterday and they had a long article on pets being over-vaccinated. It was talking about most schools and the AVMA recommending vaccinating every 3 years vs annually but that vets push the one years. Just curious what everyone has seen working in the field. Do the vets you work for usually prefer 1 year vaccs or 3 year vaccs? Mine likes to give the one year over the 3 and then run titers yearly or keep up with the annual.

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[soccerduck11]

The vet I work for does annual vaccs, but I think its mainly because the city requires a yearly rabies vacc in order to register pets within city limits so he has to offer it yearly.

 

[Angie09]

One of my vets switched to 3-years when the AVMA recommendation came out; the other does annuals. If the dog is older and has a long vax history, she doesn't give the whole volume of vaccine, but she says that a lot of owners wouldn't bring their pets in at all if they weren't coming for vaccinations, and she doesn't think every 3 years is frequent enough for physicals. I see her point.

 

[kixx]

The poll needs more options!

We do FVRCP and Rabies every 3 years for indoor cats, if the cat is outdoors, we do FVRCP, Felv yearly but still do Rabies every 3.

For dogs, we do DHPP, corona and bordatella yearly, but rabies every 3 years. We stop doing corona on older dogs.

 

[kate_g]

It was talking about most schools and the AVMA recommending vaccinating every 3 years vs annually but that vets push the one years.

The issue is quite a bit more complicated than that, it's a shame the article portrayed it that way... I forget how this whole story goes right now but I've heard the vet I'm currently shadowing tell it many times. (And BTW he's generally very anti-over-vaccinating: truly indoor cats don't get FeLV or even rabies, cats over 6 or 7 with known early vax history don't get FVRCP at all. And it's not exactly a vaccine, but he tells clients that dogs that don't leave Berkeley - we have no mosquitoes - don't need heartgard.) I think the issue was that the three-year rabies vaccine is the one that had the reports of fibrosarcomas at inocculation sites. He used it when it first came out, but actually saw quite a few fibrosarcoma cases so switched back to the one-year vaccine, which has less risk. There's a sub-issue, which is that the one-year vaccine was apparently up for approval for administering every three years, but the FDA wanted them to re-do all their studies with bigger sample sizes or something. The company didn't want to do that (big cost for them, plus the lives of hundreds of animals), so they settled for keeping one-year approval. (This is the reason the vet cites when he skips the rabies shot for indoor-only cats - "it's probably good for more than a year anyway.") With dogs you pretty much have to do whatever your state/county/city requires for licensing - but although the 3-year rabies vaccine is acceptable for dog licenses here, this clinic uses the yearly because of the fibrosarcoma issue.

Then there's the whole thing about the transdermal vaccine for FeLV that offers longer immunity, but is such a pain in the butt to set up and use that I know a couple vets that just refuse and give the shot instead.

I think in a lot of cases, yearly vaccinations are just a way to ensure that clients actually get their pets seen every year, and it saves the vet (or the client, particularly if you're talking about the kind of people who go to a different vet every time) having to keep track of the fact that Fluffy got her last rabies two years ago, but is due for the combo this year...

Oh, and according to this same vet the company that makes the FVRCP - not sure if it's true for the dog combo too - is considering breaking the vaccine up into three components, so that you give one shot a year but each year it's a different 3-year vaccine. While this might make medical sense from the point of view of reducing vaccine reactions by not asking the immune system to take on so much all at once, it would also have the attractive side effect of requiring your clients to come in yearly even though you're giving 3-year vaccines...

 

[medicalmarvel]

The issue is quite a bit more complicated than that, it's a shame the article portrayed it that way... I forget how this whole story goes right now but I've heard the vet I'm currently shadowing tell it many times. (And BTW he's generally very anti-over-vaccinating: truly indoor cats don't get FeLV or even rabies, cats over 6 or 7 with known early vax history don't get FVRCP at all. And it's not exactly a vaccine, but he tells clients that dogs that don't leave Berkeley - we have no mosquitoes - don't need heartgard.) I think the issue was that the three-year rabies vaccine is the one that had the reports of fibrosarcomas at inocculation sites. He used it when it first came out, but actually saw quite a few fibrosarcoma cases so switched back to the one-year vaccine, which has less risk. There's a sub-issue, which is that the one-year vaccine was apparently up for approval for administering every three years, but the FDA wanted them to re-do all their studies with bigger sample sizes or something. The company didn't want to do that (big cost for them, plus the lives of hundreds of animals), so they settled for keeping one-year approval. (This is the reason the vet cites when he skips the rabies shot for indoor-only cats - "it's probably good for more than a year anyway.") With dogs you pretty much have to do whatever your state/county/city requires for licensing - but although the 3-year rabies vaccine is acceptable for dog licenses here, this clinic uses the yearly because of the fibrosarcoma issue.

Then there's the whole thing about the transdermal vaccine for FeLV that offers longer immunity, but is such a pain in the butt to set up and use that I know a couple vets that just refuse and give the shot instead.

I think in a lot of cases, yearly vaccinations are just a way to ensure that clients actually get their pets seen every year, and it saves the vet (or the client, particularly if you're talking about the kind of people who go to a different vet every time) having to keep track of the fact that Fluffy got her last rabies two years ago, but is due for the combo this year...

Oh, and according to this same vet the company that makes the FVRCP - not sure if it's true for the dog combo too - is considering breaking the vaccine up into three components, so that you give one shot a year but each year it's a different 3-year vaccine. While this might make medical sense from the point of view of reducing vaccine reactions by not asking the immune system to take on so much all at once, it would also have the attractive side effect of requiring your clients to come in yearly even though you're giving 3-year vaccines...

i think this is a very good idea given by you. actually i was looking for some info just like his .. so accept my unexpected thnx...

 

[autumn shimmer]

Has anyone compared the titre value of the 3 year vaccine compared to the 1 year vaccine. My vet said that the titre value of the three year vaccine drops to about 30% and essentially wasn't effective enough to stand behind if a three-year vaccinated dog came under question. If this is the case I wouldn't think it would be recommended. I didn't know if this was true or if anyone had heard any different.

 

[wivet2011]

The poll needs more options!

We do FVRCP and Rabies every 3 years for indoor cats, if the cat is outdoors, we do FVRCP, Felv yearly but still do Rabies every 3.

For dogs, we do DHPP, corona and bordatella yearly, but rabies every 3 years. We stop doing corona on older dogs.

I agree, we need more options! We do 3 year rabies for most dogs and 1 year rabies for cats and older dogs. Everything else is yearly.

 

[linzucf]

Has anyone compared the titre value of the 3 year vaccine compared to the 1 year vaccine. My vet said that the titre value of the three year vaccine drops to about 30% and essentially wasn't effective enough to stand behind if a three-year vaccinated dog came under question. If this is the case I wouldn't think it would be recommended. I didn't know if this was true or if anyone had heard any different.

The three year titer, from my experience, does not hold up to standards. We had a client insisting that her pet should not be vaccinated this year and the doctor offered her the option to send of for titers to check if her vaccines were still valid. It had only been one year since her dog's prior vaccination, but none of the levels came back within an acceptable range, thus the dog needed to be vaccinated. I do not agree with extending vaccine protocols after this incident.

Another problem, as mentioned before, with 3 year programs is that they do not see their veterinarian for annual exams--this is even worse for veterinarians who do not vaccinate older/indoor cats. In older cats it is especially important for annual bloodwork and monitoring of kidney function. I work in an emergency/critical care facility, and so often see older cats who are beyond treatment only because the veterinarian told the owners they did not need to vaccinate their older pets and thus the owners took that to understand they didn't need to go to the vet for the past 5 years and their now 13 year old cat is in end-stage renal failure with a very poor prognosis. Granted their cat was unlikely to acquire any diseases indoors, but the preventative care they could have received with routine annual exams far outweighs the risks of vaccinating.

I could really go on and on about vaccination protocols, the transdermal vaccine, three year rabies protocols (and how many doctors do not meet this!!!), and on and on and on... I am very big on preventative medicine and client education.

If you have questions about vaccine protocols, new vaccines (5s lepto, malignant melanoma, dental, etc.), you should contact your local drug rep. Most are more than happy to talk to you, especially if they know that you are prevet. Also, you can have your office manager schedule a lunch for the whole clinic where the drug rep gives a presentation (and brings lunch)--Merial has very good presentations on parasite prevention, vaccine protocols, as well as practice management.